Improved fork for feach-farers



D. n. eooDELL, or 'A NTRIM N'nW-'Haiiirs'ninn v Leners Manilva. 102,934,man May 10,1870.

The Schedule referred to in these Letters Patent and making part of thesame lo all fwhomtt may concern:

`Be it known that I, D. H. GOODELL, of Antrim, in

4the county of Hillsborough and State of New Hampshire, yhzwe'inventedanImprovement in Peach-Parels and I do hereby declare that `the following,takenK in` connection with the drawings which accompany and form part ofthis spcciicatiom is .adescriptiou of my invention sufficient to enablethose skilled in the art to practice. it.

My invention has reference-to the construction of;

, the peach-holding fork of a peach-paring machine.

' In apple-paring machines the fork is generallymadc tlneep`ronged,'andthe apple is pressed upon the fork regardless of any particularpresentation of the apple, so long as the fork is carried centrallythrough'tlie core', there being nothing to interfere with the entranceofthe prongs.l

With peaches, however, the sa-me construction will i not answer, becausethe prong points bring up against and are stopped by-the'peach-stone.

It is necessary, therefore, to spread the prongs far enough apart tostraddle the stone or embrace it between them; buta three-pronged forkis not practicable for this purpose, anda two-pronged fork -has beenmade, having a groove in the inner face of each prong,I

the opposite edges orA sharp corners'of the stone slipping iixto thesegrooves, and thus holding the peach se-` curely during theparingoperation.

Now ythis construction is ecient in holding the peach when the edges ofthe peach-stone fit 'into the forked grooves; but, if the peach-stone istoo large or too small for the fork, or if the prong-grooves fail toslip over the edges, (and this they are very aptto do,) the peach willnot be securely held.

4 Lhe object of my invention is to so construct a fork as 4to insure itstaking hold of and tightlyembracing the stone, and this I accomplish byusing-a fourpronged fork, between which the stone cannot failto enterandbe held; and y H My 'invention consists in combining, with a paringmechanism, afour-pronged fork, for the better adaptation of the machineto the paring of peaches.

lhe drawing represents a fruit-paring machine embo ying my improvement.

shows a plan of the machine.-

B, a side View, and

C, an en d view ofthe fork grasping'a peach-'stone.- y .a denotes thestationary gear-plate, having a segmental gear, b, into which meshesapinion, c, on a' shaft carrying a gear, (l, which meshes into anddrives a pinion, c, on the fork-shaft c, the rotation of pinion c beingeffected by horizontal reciprocating movement ofthe handle f.my

G denotes the paring-knife, fixed upon a suitable knife-rod, and held upto the surface of the fruit by a suitable spring.l All'theseparts areshown arranged like the corresponding parts in a `common and Wellknownparer, or may be relatively arranged in any other suitable manner, andneed not be further described. i

h denotes the fruit-holding fork, consisting of four prongs, i,preferably placed equidistant each from the adjacent prongs, and flaringslightly, if desirable,

Now, as the depressed line upon the surface of a peach indicates' theline of the sharp corner or edge of the peach, (the two being in thesame plane,) it will readily be seen that in pressing a peach upon thefork it can always be so guided `that the stone cannot fail to enter thefork between the prongs, as seen at B and U, or with two prongsstraddl'ing one edge of the peach, and the opposite two the oppositeedge, cach two being equidistant from the edge between them, (the stonebeing thereby rmly grasped,) and of course securely holding the rotatingpeach under the pressing and cntting action of the knife; and it will beobvious that such a disposition of the forks affords the only practicalconstruction for peach-paring, as no arrangement of three or two forkscan be depended upon-to thus clasp or grasp the stone.

The spring forks or wires, it will be seen,v are ini serted .in thestock so as to be near toeachothcr;

they are then spread out from and near the stock,

shown, and then for the rest oftheirlengths are strai gh t,and'parallel, ornearly so, with each other.l VBy means of thisconstruct-ion, andthe use of four such prongs,

each so bent, the peach-stone is not only firmly heldA at fourpoints,but the bent portions also hold it steadily at its curved end and thedevice is equallyapplicablc, by reason of having the straight parts ofthe-fork, for use in paring other fr'uit which is stoneless, as thcstraight prongs do not, like those which are curved c from'end to end,cut and destroy the fruit whilst being inserted in and withdrawn fromit.

I claim a fork, having four separate spring prongs, which vspread outfrom and near the stock, andare then straight, or nearly so, as shownand described.

Y D. H. G OODELL.

Witnesses:

` J. B. CROSBY,l

FRANCIS GoULn.

